A Little Bit About Me

I’ve just wrapped up about my tenth year of professional work, so it feels appropriate to reflect on how I got here and what I’ve learned. 

As long as I don’t compare myself to others, I can feel pretty happy and proud of where I am today. The last two jobs I’ve held were absolute dream jobs where I was challenged and grew immensely. Over the next few months, I am wrapping my third and final year as Chief Financial and Operating Officer at Rihanna’s Clara Lionel Foundation, a dream job for sure. 

A quick note on how I got here. I grew up in California in a mixed-status family, something about the immigrant experience made me keenly aware of injustice and discrimination, and a predisposition towards empathy made me want to address injustice and generally help others. I studied Biology and Bioethics before falling into the social impact ops and finance space. 

I was an assistant on my first audit in 2014; this year, I’ve successfully delivered my 15th audit (for an exponentially larger and more complex budget). Of course I do more audits, though very few people in my life understand what I do, here’s a short list of things I’m responsible for: setting budgets, managing the accounting, creating financial reports, creating an investment policy, managing investments, vetting and hiring vendors, reviewing and signing contracts, evaluating organizational risk, purchasing organizational insurance, setting benefits policies, designing recruitment processes, making hiring and firing decisions, facilitating performance management, guiding organizational culture, evaluating and implementing new tech tools, managing and securing our digital infrastructure, and other projects as directed. 

I love the work that I do.